Maybe my wife and I are alone in this, but I don't think so. We definitely feel like better parents after watching a few episodes of The Cosby Show together, and even more so if we do it together with the girls, who love the show as much as we do, if not more.
It's odd to say this seeing as we're basically a family that never watches television, particularly my wife and I (the girls watch it greedily every chance they get at someone else's house). Way back when, soon after my wife and I met, though, we sat down and watched Bill Cosby: Himself with my mom one night and laughed our heads off. Seriously, that's some funny stuff. That, of course, made us want to watch more Cosby hijinks, and so in no time, we had bellied up and bought a couple of seasons of the immortal show on DVD. When there's not much else to do, one of the girls will pop one of those DVD's into the player, and before you know it, family time is happening.
It's great, although I'm definitely not the first person to say this: The Cosby Show is family programming perfection. It's funny for kids; it's funny for adults (for wholly different reasons); it's funny for non-parents; it's funnier for parents; it's funny for teenagers; it's clean; it's non-violent; it promotes being successful; it's family-oriented; it's filled with values; and it gives fantastic advice on how to succeed as any of a parent, child, or teen in a family dynamic. It also comes loaded with an over-healthy dose of 1980's kitsch that makes those of us old enough to remember it either just a bit nostalgic or just a bit embarrassed to have signed on. Of course, explaining the 1980's (particularly the fashion!) to children of today sets up wonderful opportunities to discuss fads and how ugly they'll think their clothing is in a couple of decades or so. The DVD's of course come with the added bonuses of never having to sit through commercials or deal with programming schedules.
The other day, the girls put the videos in, and I came around and discovered that it was on just at one of my all-time favorite scenes. The precocious son Theo (age 13), who apparently has bad grades and is a general let-down in many ways, has been hounded about this kind of thing throughout the entire show. He's in his room at the end delivering a powerful speech to his dad (THE Cos) about how "maybe I'm not going to be a doctor... maybe if you weren't a doctor I'd love you just as much because you're my dad, and so maybe, just maybe, you can love me for who I am, just who I am, because I'm your son."
The audience erupts with emotionally evoked applause at this point and Theo stands silently, trying to look serious, awaiting his loving father's reply and for the live studio audience to calm down. His stance is very "I'm Hamlet and just delivered a moving sillioquy, what have you got to say about it?" Dad stands up. It's very exciting because it looks like he's about to deliver a powerful family-oriented, I-love-you-son kind of response, and then in a very real, very true, very funny way expresses irreconcilable frustration in voice, tone, and manner as he says: "Theo... that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my entire life. No wonder you make D's." He continues his tirade with something to the tune of "if you would try instead of being lazy" or something that I don't think I've ever heard because I'm too busy almost pissing myself over the "stupidest thing I've ever heard" part and the "no wonder you make D's."
I think it's good for me to watch that because it doesn't fill my head with B.S. responses to give the girls. I think it's good for the girls to watch it because every kid tries some eloquent speech of that sort at some point in their lives (or several times) and expects the tv-and-movies response of "You're right, son, gosh. Let's get some ice cream!" that couldn't be further from a realistic response in that kind of situation and obviously isn't good for the child because it merely panders to them.
If anyone's curious, my most elegant speech to my mother came off a bit more like an attourney's debating in which I researched and then informed my mother of my Constitutional rights as a citizen of the United States of America and exactly how she was denying those, citing the specific Amendments that she was withholding from me. Her rebuttal was as follows:
"This country is free, and its citizens do have inalienable Constitutional rights. You however," she said, "live in my house, which is a monarchy, and I'm the queen. You therefore have no rights in this house except to do as I say when I say it until you move out, and if you'd like to leave now, I'll pack a bag for you and take you far enough away where you can't find your way back anytime quickly." I think I was seven. Staying at home, under the rule of Queen Mom, sounded like a good idea.
Of course, Bill delivers some wonderful other lines in there too... in another episode is another favorite of mine. Talking with his teenage daughter, Denise (age 16), she clearly decides she has an opinion on something, and Bill asks for it. How he does it is genius (and perfect for precocious teenage girls in my household to watch): "Come on, tell me. I want to hear whatever gems of teenage wisdom you have to spew out." Beautiful.
Another favorite was once when one of the Cosby girls (Vanessa, age 12) gets in trouble for wearing makeup when she was expressly told that she wasn't allowed to (but felt like doing it anyway). Sullen and Moody got really mad that Vanessa got in trouble for that, thinking that the makeup-wearing was minor and shouldn't have entailed the grounding that she got. In fact, she got so upset about it that she bulled up and was very difficult to talk to about it for hours. Finally, after a while, we got out of her that it made her upset because she feels like she gets in trouble for a lot of "stupid little things" like that, which we were eventually able to put into a better perpsective for her (via convincing her that Vanessa, on the show, got in trouble for disobeying a rule, whether that rule was reasonable or not, which is not a "stupid little thing").
If you don't watch The Cosby Show with your kids (and grandkids?), I think the money for the DVD's is well-spent and maybe should be invested. I'm a huge advocate, and as my wife and I say, it very well could improve your parenting skills.
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